This book contains selected and expanded contributions presented at the 15th Conference on Acoustics and Vibration of Mechanical Structures held in Timisoara, Romania, May 30-31, 2019. The conference focused on a broad range of topics related to acoustics and vibration, such as analytical approaches to nonlinear noise and vibration problems, environmental and occupational noise, structural vibration, biomechanics and bioacoustics, as well as experimental approaches to vibration problems in industrial processes. The different contributions also address the analytical, numerical and experimental techniques applicable to analyze linear and non-linear noise and vibration problems (including strong nonlinearity) and they are primarily intended to emphasize the actual trends and state-of-the-art developments in the above mentioned topics. The book is meant for academics, researchers and professionals, as well as PhD students concerned with various fields of acoustics and vibration of mechanical structures.

This book intends directly the practical engineers, who will be of great interest in reading the interesting chapters. Earthwork projects are critical components in civil construction and often require detailed management techniques and unique solution methods to address failures. Being earthbound, earthwork is influenced by geomaterial properties at the onset of a project. Hence, an understanding of the in-situ soil properties and all geotechnical aspects is essential. Analytical methods for earth structures remain critical for researchers due to the mechanical complexity of the system. Striving for better earthwork project management, the geotechnical engineering community continues to find improved testing techniques for determining sensitive properties of soil and rock, including stress wave-based, non-destructive testing methods. To minimize failure during earthwork construction, past case studies and data may reveal useful lessons and information to improve project management and minimize economic losses.

Light of the Stars tells a radically new story about what we are: one world in a universe awash in planets. Building on his widely discussed scientific papers and The New York Times op-eds, astrophysicist Adam Frank shows that not only is it likely that alien civilisations have existed many times before but that many of them have driven their own worlds into dangerous eras of change. He explains how dust storms on Mars, the greenhouse effect on Venus, Gaia Theory, the threat of nuclear winter, and efforts to prove or disprove the plurality of worlds from Aristotle to Copernicus to Carl Sagan have contributed to our understanding of our place in the universe and the growing challenge of climate change. And he explores what may be the largest question of all: if there has been life on other worlds, what its presence can tell us about our own fate.

This book comprises the proceedings of the Fifth International Conference in Ocean Engineering (ICOE2019) focusing on emerging opportunities and challenges in the field of ocean engineering and offshore structures. Some of the themes covered in this volume are offshore structures and deepwater technology, ocean optics & acoustics, ocean renewable energy, marine spatial planning, climate change impacts & disaster risk reduction, etc. The essays are written by leading international experts, making it a valuable resource for researchers and practicing engineers alike.

This book is a rich source of information on design research and solutions for the support and development of space missions. International experiences and researches are presented in order to cast light on the role of space design in improving living and working conditions in outer space and to highlight the particularities of the necessary design skills, taking into account specific requirements and constraints. The challenge facing designers is how to approach environmentally extreme conditions in such a way that they are transformed from limitations into opportunities. The author has herself developed products that have been tested during on-orbit experiments on the International Space Station. Drawing on this unique experience and other case studies, the author proposes a new design methodology for space and demonstrates how the discipline of design is able to generate innovation thanks to the strong capacity of visioning. Ultimately this will lead to the development of further new equipment for astronauts that will facilitate space travel. While the book is intended primarily for students and researchers, it is also of interest for a broad readership attracted by space, innovation, and future scenarios.

This book provides an in-depth investigation of the quality relevant perceptual video space in the domain of videotelephony. The author presents an extensive investigation and quality modeling of the underlying video quality dimensions and the overall quality. The author examines the underlying quality dimensions and describes a method for subjective evaluation as well as the instrumental estimation of video quality in videotelephony. The book presents a new subjective test method in the field of video quality assessment. Further, it explains the experimental examination of the underlying video quality dimensions and the subjective-based, as well as instrumental-based quality estimation. Provides an investigation of the underlying quality dimensions of video in videotelephony; Presents insights into a new subjective test method, standardized as ITU-T Rec. P.918; Includes insights into the subjective and instrumental video quality estimation.

Acoustic Emission and Related Non-destructive Evaluation Techniques in the Fracture Mechanics of Concrete: Fundamentals and Applications, Second Edition presents innovative Acoustic Emission (AE) and related non-destructive evaluation (NDE) techniques that are used for damage detection and inspection of aged and deteriorated concrete structures. This new edition includes multi-modal applications such as DIC, thermography, X-ray and in-situ implementations, all of which are helpful in better understanding feasibility and underlying challenges. This new edition is an essential resource for civil engineers, contractors working in construction, and materials scientists working both in industry and academia.

This book focuses on advanced methods for the structural and thermal analysis of deepwater pipelines and risers. It discusses the limit strength of sandwich pipes, including finite-element analysis using Python scripts, collapse of sandwich pipes with cementitious/polymer composites, buckle propagation of sandwich pipes, dynamic behavior of subsea pipes, flow-induced vibration of functionally graded pipes, two-phase flow-induced vibration of pipelines, vortex-induced vibration of free-spanning pipelines, and the thermal analysis of composites pipes with passive insulation, active heating, and phase change material layers. It also explores structural analysis using finite element analysis and the integral transform technique for fluid-structure interaction. Lastly, the use of lumped parameter formulations combined with finite differences for the thermal analysis of pipelines is examined.

In this book the background and context of Africa's political and socio-economic landscape is presented and unpacked through a primary needs approach which focuses on climate, biodiversity, health, water, education, and space-related capacity building. African theoretical contributions from the International Relations field are discussed, and Africa's new Space Policy and Strategy, along with debates around the establishment of an African Space Agency, are explored. The African International Space Ecosystem is then analyzed, including its dimensions of intra-African space relations and initiatives, African participation in COPUOS, and international space activities, agreements, and initiatives in Africa. The final part is dedicated to the national space infrastructure and activities of African states.

The book investigates the role of artificial input delay in approximating unknown system dynamics, referred to as time-delayed control (TDC), and provides novel solutions to current design issues in TDC. Its central focus is on designing adaptive-switching gain-based robust control (ARC) for a class of Euler-Lagrange (EL) systems with minimal or no knowledge of the system dynamics parameters. The newly proposed TDC-based ARC tackles the commonly observed over- and under-estimation issues in switching gain. The consideration of EL systems lends a practical perspective on the proposed methods, and each chapter is supplemented by relevant experimental data. The book offers a unique resource for researchers in the areas of ARC and TDC alike, and covers the state of the art, new algorithms, and future directions.

This book discusses statistical process control (SPC) concepts, emphasizing the need to establish stability of work processes. It gives the elements required to develop a defect prevention system (DPS), and integrates the application of process control and problem analysis tools.

Over the past 60 years, artificial intelligence has grown from an academic field of research to a ubiquitous array of tools used in everyday technology. Despite its many recent successes, certain meaningful facets of computational intelligence have yet to be thoroughly explored, such as a wide array of complex mental tasks that humans carry out easily, yet are difficult for computers to mimic. A prime example of a domain in which human intelligence thrives, but machine understanding is still fairly limited, is music. Over recent decades, many researchers have used computational tools to perform tasks like genre identification, music summarization, music database querying, and melodic segmentation. While these are all useful algorithmic solutions, we are still a long way from constructing complete music agents able to mimic (at least partially) the complexity with which humans approach music. One key aspect that hasn't been sufficiently studied is that of sequential decision-making in musical intelligence. Addressing this gap, the book focuses on two aspects of musical intelligence: music recommendation and multi-agent interaction in the context of music. Though motivated primarily by music-related tasks, and focusing largely on people's musical preferences, the work presented in this book also establishes that insights from music-specific case studies can also be applicable in other concrete social domains, such as content recommendation.Showing the generality of insights from musical data in other contexts provides evidence for the utility of music domains as testbeds for the development of general artificial intelligence techniques.Ultimately, this thesis demonstrates the overall value of taking a sequential decision-making approach in settings previously unexplored from this perspective.

This book consists of selected and peer-reviewed papers presented at the 13th International Conference on Vibration Problems (ICOVP 2017). The topics covered in this book include different structural vibration problems such as dynamics and stability under normal and seismic loading, and wave propagation. The book also discusses different materials such as composite, piezoelectric, and functionally graded materials for improving the stiffness and damping properties of structures. The contents of this book can be useful for beginners, researchers and professionals interested in structural vibration and other allied fields.

This book gathers the peer-reviewed proceedings of the 14th International Symposium, PRADS 2019, held in Yokohama, Japan, in September 2019. It brings together naval architects, engineers, academic researchers and professionals who are involved in ships and other floating structures to share the latest research advances in the field. The contents cover a broad range of topics, including design synthesis for ships and floating systems, production, hydrodynamics, and structures and materials. Reflecting the latest advances, the book will be of interest to researchers and practitioners alike.

This volume gathers the latest advances, innovations, and applications in the field of mining, geology and geo-spatial technologies, as presented by leading researchers and engineers at the International Conference on Innovations for Sustainable and Responsible Mining (ISRM), held in Hanoi, Vietnam on October 15-17 2020. The contributions cover a diverse range of topics, including mining technology, drilling and blasting engineering, tunneling and geotechnical applications, mineral processing, mine management and economy, environmental risk assessment and management, mining and local development, mined land rehabilitation, water management and hydrogeology, regional Geology and tectonics, spatial engineering for monitoring natural resources and environment change, GIS and remote sensing for natural disaster monitoring, risk mapping and revisualization, natural resources monitoring and management, mine occupational safety and health. Selected by means of a rigorous peer-review process, they will spur novel research directions and foster future multidisciplinary collaborations.

This book gathers the peer-reviewed proceedings of the 14th International Symposium, PRADS 2019, held in Yokohama, Japan, in September 2019. It brings together naval architects, engineers, academic researchers and professionals who are involved in ships and other floating structures to share the latest research advances in the field. The contents cover a broad range of topics, including design synthesis for ships and floating systems, production, hydrodynamics, and structures and materials. Reflecting the latest advances, the book will be of interest to researchers and practitioners alike.

This book gathers the peer-reviewed proceedings of the 14th International Symposium, PRADS 2019, held in Yokohama, Japan, in September 2019. It brings together naval architects, engineers, academic researchers and professionals who are involved in ships and other floating structures to share the latest research advances in the field. The contents cover a broad range of topics, including design synthesis for ships and floating systems, production, hydrodynamics, and structures and materials. Reflecting the latest advances, the book will be of interest to researchers and practitioners alike.

In the late 20th and beginning 21st century high-precision astronomy, positioning and metrology strongly rely on general relativity. Supported by exercises and solutions this book offers graduate students and researchers entering those fields a self-contained and exhaustive but accessible treatment of applied general relativity. The book is written in a homogenous (graduate level textbook) style allowing the reader to understand the arguments step by step. It first introduces the mathematical and theoretical foundations of gravity theory and then concentrates on its general relativistic applications: clock rates, clock sychronization, establishment of time scales, astronomical references frames, relativistic astrometry, celestial mechanics and metrology. The authors present up-to-date relativistic models for applied techniques such as Satellite LASER Ranging (SLR), Lunar LASER Ranging (LLR), Globale Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS), Very Large Baseline Interferometry (VLBI), radar measurements, gyroscopes and pulsar timing. A list of acronyms helps the reader keep an overview and a mathematical appendix provides required functions and terms.

Papers of the Second International Symposium on Continous Surface Mining held in Austin, TX, Oct. 1988. Printed in the Netherlands on acidic paper. No index. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.

This book explains the basic technologies, concepts, approaches, and terms used in relation to reservoir rocks. Accessible to engineers in varying roles, it provides the tools necessary for building reservoir characterization and simulation models that improve resource definition and recovery, even in complex depositional environments. The book is enriched with numerous examples from a wide variety of applications, to help readers understand the topics. It also describes in detail the key relationships between the different rock properties and their variables. As such, it is of interest to researchers, engineers, lab technicians, and postgraduate students in the field of petroleum engineering.

Africa faces numerous challenges relating to good governance due to its vast and diverse landscape, as well as its history. This book explores the role of space-based applications in supporting African good governance by strengthening civil society, bolstering democratic processes and advancing socio-economic development. The increased use of such applications can accelerate Africa's progress towards the United Nations Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Goals, as well as the African Union's Agenda 2063 aspirations This book examines key challenges facing governance within African to provide an accurate account of the current African context. It discusses specific examples of e-governance and digital solutions that leverage space-based technologies and have been successfully implemented in both the developed and developing world. In the context of the numerous satellite constellations being deployed to provide affordable Internet connectivity globally, it examines the major actors in this sector and presents additional governance solutions based on remote sensing and Earth observation data. Given its scope, the book will be of interest to professionals and students in the fields of development, governance and space studies.

This open access book offers a timely guide to challenges and current practices to permanently plug and abandon hydrocarbon wells. With a focus on offshore North Sea, it analyzes the process of plug and abandonment of hydrocarbon wells through the establishment of permanent well barriers. It provides the reader with extensive knowledge on the type of barriers, their functioning and verification. It then discusses plug and abandonment methodologies, analyzing different types of permanent plugging materials. Last, it describes some tests for verifying the integrity and functionality of installed permanent barriers. The book offers a comprehensive reference guide to well plugging and abandonment (P&A) and well integrity testing. The book also presents new technologies that have been proposed to be used in plugging and abandoning of wells, which might be game-changing technologies, but they are still in laboratory or testing level. Given its scope, it addresses students and researchers in both academia and industry. It also provides information for engineers who work in petroleum industry and should be familiarized with P&A of hydrocarbon wells to reduce the time of P&A by considering it during well planning and construction.